suppose that it was
printed from any copy other than the First, they may be merely the
result of carelessness.

FIRST EDITION SECOND EDITION

p. 3, line 4, enthron'd, with inthron'd with
3 8, Arts ... steps Art's ... step's
11 10, Rods; Rods?
13 26, to Descend do Descend
14 17, couch, couch
29 9, Cedar Cedars
31 21, Temples Temple

[Footnote 8: "The Attacks on John Dryden," _Essays and Studies by
Members of the English Association_, XXI, 41-74.]

[Footnote 9: Joseph Spence, _Anecdotes ... of Books and Men_ (1858),
p. 51.]

For "No Link ... night" (p. 35, lines 19-24), the Second Edition
substitutes, for an undetermined reason, the following:

No less the Lordly Zelecks Glory sound
For courage and for Constancy renoun'd:
Though once in naught but borrow'd plumes adorn'd,
So much all servile Flattery he scorn'd;
That though he held his Being and Support,
By that weak Thread the Favour of a Court,
In Sanhedrims unbrib'd, he firmly bold
Durst Truth and Israels Right unmov'd uphold;
In spight of Fortune, still to Honour wed,
By Justice steer'd, though by Dependence fed.

Very little can be said of Pordage's poem, beyond its date of
publication (January 17, 1681/2)[10] and the fact that no parallel has
been found with his earlier work. As no detailed study on him, published
or unpublished, has been traced, we can only have recourse to the
standard works on the period; data thus easily accessible are not
therefore reproduced here. A so-called second edition (MacDonald 205b)
is identical with the first.

[Footnote 10: _Modern Philology_, XXV (1928) 409-416.]

In conclusion a few comments may be made on the general situation into
which the poems fit. It will be remembered that _Absalom and Achitophel_
appeared after the Exclusion Bill, the purpose of which was to debar
James Duke of York from the Protestant succession, had been rejected by
the House of Lords, mainly through the efforts of Halifax. Dryden's poem
was advertised on November 17, 1681, and we may safely assume that it
was published only a short time before Settle and our other authors
were hired by the Whigs to answer it. Full details have not survived;
one suspects Shaftesbury's Green Ribbon Club. That such replies were
considered necessary testifies both to the